Squeezed middle are burdened by non tax-paying lower earners

THE business of the next week-and-a-half is budget making, writes Gerard Howlin. 

By Friday week, nearly everything will be settled, if it can. What hangs over, over the last weekend, will be political high-wire stuff. The challenge for Government is to get a budget — any budget — through and survive. The challenge for Fianna Fáil is to facilitate the process and lend its support without leaking political capital.

Arguably, leakage has begun for Fianna Fáil. Opinion polls, albeit within the margin of error, show slight slippage or at least an interruption of an upward trajectory unchecked since the general election campaign.